Talk about The tragedy of being bored. Now and then, a movie earns more undeserved praise than it is worth because of an established director securing multiple acting heavyweights. The most recent example I can think of was in 2017 when Steven Spielberg combined with Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks for The Post; the movie was dubbed an Oscar lock, especially after 2015’s fantastic movie Spotlight (also about a newspaper reporting a highly publicized scandal) received six Academy Award nominations, including two wins. Drab, The Post failed to meet expectations, earning just six Academy Award nominations and winning just two.
Category Archives: Mystery
Antlers (2021)
In an interview with Inverse to promote his 2021 horror film Antlers, director Scott Cooper said, “I tend never to make the same film in the same genre. The great danger as a filmmaker is in doing safe work. I always like to be in an uncomfortable space.” While admirable, if you can do something really well, there is also the argument to stay within that genre as you continue to perfect your craft. Antlers is the fifth film directed by Cooper and the first one that dips outside the norms of reality. Three of his first four (Out of the Furnace, Crazy Heart, Hostiles) finished in my End of Year Top 3, while his fourth (Black Mass) was a movie I did not enjoy. Antlers was far better than Black Mass, but it is not a candidate to finish in my Top 10 Movies of 2021.
Stillwater (2021)
Inspired loosely around the story of an American college student accused of murder in a foreign country but proclaiming her innocence while studying abroad, director Tom McCarthy tries to recapture the magic of Spotlight in Stillwater, his first effort since 2015’s Best Picture Winner. Many of us (not including me) remember the Amanda Knox story from 20 years ago. Knox, studying abroad in Italy, was convicted of killing her roommate. She spent four years in prison before ultimately being acquitted by the Italian Supreme Court. McCarthy’s film is far from a true story, though this might be his second Best Picture nominee in five years if it had been. However, this being a work of fiction does lead to too much implausibility and story convenience. It doesn’t make it a better or worse movie per se. But it does make it a slightly less believable one.
Old (2021)
So highly ambitious, so incredibly flawed, but oh so engrossing is M. Night Shyamalan’s (Signs, The Sixth Sense) return to form his latest mind-**** Old. Suppose you’re new to Shyamalan (which I would understand if you are a bit younger and have avoided all of his critical flops since 2002’s Signs, Old might be the coolest thing you’ve ever seen. For the rest of us, we know that somewhere in the film will have a twist. It’s a matter of either trying to figure it out (which is something we inherently do now) or trying to enjoy the ride. I attempted to do both. I succeeded in enjoying the ride. I did not figure out the twist. There’s also the idea that Shyamalan might try to do one of these types of movies without a twist so that it also can be something that plays in your mind. All in all, I was able to set aside all of the many, many imperfections associated with Old and appreciate it for what it was worth and then some.
Pig (2021)
Knowing little about it, I went into my local theater to watch Michael Sarnoski’s directorial debut, Pig. I saw it playing at my local theater, checked out its score on Rotten Tomatoes (97% and 95%), and then looked at the scores assigned by Richard Roeper (4/4 stars) and also the score on Roger Ebert’s website (also 4/4 stars). The movie poster made it look like a backwoods thriller. It was enough for me. I had no idea what the movie was even about. I recall when I saw David Fincher’s Se7en back in 1995. I knew nothing about that film, which is one reason I am still so mesmerized and starstruck by that film. Had I learned more about it, it still would have been a forever classic with me. But there was something about that journey of not knowing anything about it but being completely engrossed by it. The comparison between Se7en and Pig ends there but is a notable mention nonetheless.